HEALTHCARE WORKFORCE PLANNING

Healthcare Workforce Planning

Healthcare Workforce Planning

Health Department: Effective Workforce Planning

Effective workforce planning in health care sector ensures that the organization has a workforce of correct size, with the accurate skills, organized in the right manner with proper allocation of budget and is delivering their services to provide the best possible outcome. To acquire this aspect workforce plans are made at different levels. At an ordinary level, plans are made once in a month by the ward manager. He makes sure that the ward has a proper allotment of shifts, which are covered by staff with accurate competence and working skills in order to ensure that their patients are getting services effectively and safely. (Diallo, 2003)

At the complex level or higher level, the Strategic Health Authority (SHS) level workforce plan is being implemented which could be a collection of plans submitted by Primary Care Trust (PCT) and by the provider organizations that are used to support financial and strategic education and planning. The main purpose of health workforce planning is to provide management criteria for the training of health service personnel and the staffing of health services. (Bloor, 2003) The planning also provides the targets of staffing in each of the major categories that fall under health workforce management. For having a proper account of the workforce activities related to workforce management, they need to come up with an appropriate plan. The five basic steps to set out in a practical framework, elements that should be in any workforce plan are as follows: (Pallas, 2001)

Population based planning

This step is the first step towards proper workforce planning. You should be clear why you need a plan and in what context you require this plan. The scope of plan is determined that whether it will cover up the whole health economy, a single service area or a particular patient's path and consideration of the factors that are required to execute the planning process. The planning procedure can be prepared on many different levels, starting from a simple level to the complex one. The time required depends on the nature of the workforce plan, for example, it could be on weekly basis as in staff Rota system in emergency departments or it could be on monthly or annually basis as well. The plan also requires a vision about how the workforce is going to move to achieve the desired results. There are some tools required for the evaluation and monitoring according to the plan. (Hall, 1998)

Benchmarking

Next step is to identify the shape and purpose of the change in proposed services that will have its impact on the requirements of future workforce. This step is the procedure of redesigning the service in response to the patient's requirements, advancement in financial or care constraints. (Dressler, 1999) The management should be extremely clear about the current costs and its results and should be fully able to explain the identified intended beneficiaries from the change in services. The impact of the change that is going to be implemented ...